The semi-weekly fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1886-1887, 1887-11-08
Farming as a Business.

Farming as business, says Pro-
fessor Gulley, in Home md Farm, sis
not what it has been in the past. 1t re-
quires much more intelligence and skill
to farm successfully now than it did for
merly, and for variety of reasons.
"Our wants have increased. The
luxuries of our fathers have become
everyday necessities for our comfort. We
feel that we must live better, dress
better, do more, work fewer hours, and
we require more in the way of mental
Improvement, accomplishments and the
like. This is as it should be. The
farmer should have and should enjoy all
that is within the reach Of the merchant
or professional man; he is even en-
titled to more than the town resident to
make up for the isolation of life on the
farm.
1.-The fact that country people do not
have the advantages of the town people,
that farming at the present time does not
hold out such strong inducements to
young men as other occupations, not
only prevents the town bred boy from be-
coming farmer, but it also draws a large
proportion of the brightest and smartest
boys from the country to the town, and
we have as the result much larger num-
Der of the naturally gifted, shrewd men
of the country engaged in manufactures,
TRANSPORTATION, trading, etc, than we find
farming, and it naturally follows that
the smarter men secure the larger share of
the proceeds of the industries
Another disadvantage that the farmer
labOrs under-the outcome of greater
ability possessed by men in other indus
tries-is the fact that improvement in
methods of manufacture, trade, transport
tatiOn and distribution has been very
much more rapid than in farming. These
industries are growing away from the
production of farm crops.
During the past fifty years the power
of one man to turn raw products into
manufactured goods and distribute them
to consumers, through the introduction
of improved machinery and application
of scientific discoveries, has increased
from five to one hundred or more
times. We have made no such advance
IN growing crops.
cit is true The introduction of large
implements, and the binder and header,
has increased the capacity of one man
tenfold in growing and harvesting wheat,
and haying machinery to nearly as great
an extent in making Lay; but we have
only increased mans capacity two or
three fold in making corn, while in cot
ton growing it is probable that, on the
average, one man really produces less,
or at least no more than he did thirty
years ago.
"There is still another factor that is
detrimental to the interests of the farm
er, and that is the exhaustion Of the vir-
gin fertility of the soil. Except in por
tiOns of the older settled States, up to
the present time farming has been largely
of the pioneer order, which means clear
ing up the land and cropping it in such
way as to produce a crop with the least
labor, regardless of the exhaustion and
loss of the fertility of the soil, compel
ling us now to adopt some system of fer |
that is necessarily expensive to I
make the land produce as much as it did
formerly.
$50 much is said and written at the !
present time about monODOlies and unjust ,
laws which are depressing the farmer that /!
many are led to believe that the con-
dition of tie farmer may be improved
simply by legislation, While there may
be some injustice done to the farmer by
CORPORATIONS and lawmakers,
still we must study the underlying prin
2lples 81 agriculture and its connection
with other industries and raise it to par
with those pursuits before the farmer
can secure just compensation for his
labor.
Farm and Garden Notes.